Beauty Pageant
by hezziebob182
Summary: Grace has beauty, but does she know it? God asks Joan to help Grace join a beauty pageant. Chapter 2 up. Mess up with chapters fixed :s
1. Rude gestures and devine intervention

A.N: I have no idea where this came from. 'Miss Congeniality' inspired elements of it though. Grace and Luke are together; Joan and Adam are friends again, but not together.

Joan, Grace, Adam and Luke strolled down the hall of Arcadia high school.

Due to his total lack of coordination, Luke banged strait into a girl walking in the opposite direction. After foraging around on the dirty linoleum for his glasses, he regained an upright position. 'Um, hey Summer.'

Summer tossed her long blonde hair over her shoulder before pulling a compact out of her impossibly tiny handbag to reapply her lipstick, tapping her foot impatiently. Three other girls stood behind her, blocking the flow of students, waiting for her. Girls like Summer don't go anywhere alone in school. 'Well?' She asked tartly, obviously waiting for an apology, despite the complete lack of blame on Luke's part.

He blushed self consciously, causing Grace to punch him in the forearm. 'Oww!'

'I'm waiting,' Summer hissed impatiently.

'I'm s-sorry.'

She smiled triumphantly before contorting her features into their trademark sneer. 'Yeah? Whatever geek.' Turning back to her minions, she gave a high-pitched laugh before continuing her strut to Math, hips swaying seductively to silent music. The minions followed obediently.

'Haha Hehe,' Grace imitated angrily, hands raised into quotation marks. 'Bitch. What the hell is her problem?' She continued to mumble aggressively.

'Maybe she's just having a bad day?' Joan offered.

'Cha, and Hitler was just misunderstood,' Adam rolled his eyes at Joan. 'She's evil Jane, full stop.'

Joan frowned. 'If you say so...'

'Girls like Summer Stratford stand for everything I hate about our society!' The volume of Grace's rant rose to un-ignorable levels. 'Conforming to media generated images of the so called perfect woman just to gain a shred of popularity, and when that doesn't work, they resort to victimising all those around them to push everyone else down to a level lower than them!"

Luke placed a hand awkwardly on Grace's shoulder, attempting to calm her down.

'Get off!' She shrugged his hand off in agitation. 'You know what's even worse than Summer?'

'No, but I'm sure you're about to inform us.' The hurt was evident in Luke's voice.

Grace shot him a look of remorse before continuing. 'The clones! I'm not sure if they even have one brain cell between them!'

'Hey Guys!' Friedman joined them on their journey to the lockers, interrupting Grace. 'Who we talking about then?'

'Summer Stratford.' Adam replied in a slightly pained voice.

'Man! She is a BABE!' Friedman shouted, earning him several dirty looks from passers by.

Grace pointedly ignored him. 'They look like her, they talk like her, act like her…'

As if grinning at a private joke, recollection flashed through Friedman's eyes. 'I lent her… well okay she took my pen in study period last week. She wants a little bit of the Friedman, I can tell!' He nudged Adam and winked. Adam shook his head, biting down on his lip hard to stop the flow of laughter.

Grace, apparently, wasn't finished yet. 'It's like they're feeding off of her! Just because she's beautiful!'

'I bet she tastes like that apricot body cream she smells of all the time… Dude, I wonder if it's edible?'

'Friedman, SHUT UP!' Joan and Grace cried in unison.

'Fine. Shutting up.' He smiled, walking away from the group, his head full of Summer Stratford. As Grace gave rude gestures to his turned back, he walked promptly into a wall. He turned, blushing furiously. 'I'm good.' He stuck two thumbs up to emphasise his point.

Eventually, they reached the lockers. Grace had cooled somewhat after Friedman's display of idiocy. Seeing Friedman in pain was like a shot of Prozac for her.

'What do we have next?' Joan asked, having not bothered to learn her timetable.

'Advanced Chem. Yes!' Luke almost danced with enthusiasm.

'You are such a geek!' Grace pushed him slightly, causing him to fall back onto the lockers.

'I know,' he leaned over and whispered into her ear. 'It's what attracted you to me in the first place.'

'Yep. That and the sexy glasses. Do you think you could get hold of a retainer?'

'Funny. Come on, we'll be late.'

'I don't do punctual, in case you hadn't noticed.'

'I'd noticed,' he said before dragging her down the hall. Grace was roughly twice as strong and could have stopped him in a split second, but she didn't.

flyer

'You coming Jane?' Adam asked, as he watched in amazement as Grace allowed herself to be pulled along by the youngest Girardi.

'I'll follow you, okay?'

'Sure.'

Joan fumbled with the combination for a few moments before her locker opened, then grabbed her Chemistry textbook and slammed it back shut, anxious to catch up with Adam.

'Joan.' A voice behind her spoke out.

Joan spun around. 'Oh great. You.'

Old lady God smiled. 'Joan my dear, you sound so pleased to see me.'

'Listen, I'm late for Chem., so just give the cryptic stuff fast and I'll try and figure it out at lunch. Okay?'

With a slow shake of her head, God grabbed Joan by the shoulders and steered her around the corner to her classroom, but stopped just outside the door, facing her against the wall.

'What are you doing?'

'The poster. Read it'

_BEAUTY PAGEANT _

_Calling All Girls, Age 15-18._

_Compete in a series of beauty pageant events with the entrants from 5 other schools!_

_Winners will receive college scholarships._

_If interested- sign your name and add your homeroom._

Summer Stratford's name was top of the list, with about ten or so of her friends beneath it.

The panic was clear from Joan's friends. 'You always said I could say no. Well, no. No freaking way! I will not enter one of those things!'

'Always so quick to presume, Joan. I don't want you to enter.'

'You don't? Oh,' Joan became considerably brighter. 'So what? Like, just help out? I could do that, I guess.'

Old lady god shook her head once again. 'I don't want you to enter, I want her,' her hand outstretched, pointing into Joan's classroom, 'to enter.'

Joan's eyes followed the direction of the fingers. They led to Grace.

_What the hell?_

'_Grace? _You want me to get _Grace _to enter a pageant?'

'Correct. See, that wasn't so cryptic, was it?' She smiled.

'Wait,' Joan waved her hands in the air in the air for attention. 'Have you ever tuned in on Grace Polk's life? Do you honestly know what you're asking me to do? Because quite frankly, walking on water sounds easier.'

'They're going to take down all the sign up sheets after school today,' she dug around in her cardigan pockets, found a biro and passed it to Joan. 'Your call.' She turned and walked away.

'Don't you dare wave!' Joan cried, just before God raised a hand and waved a dismissive over-shoulder wave.

Sighing in exasperation, Joan stared in at her Chemistry class, to see Grace huddled up in a corner of the lab, hiding in her leather jacket. She stuck a splint into a lighted Bunsen burner flame and them waved the lighted strip around in front of her, the reflection of the fire dancing in her narrowed eyes.

'Damn,' Joan whispered to herself. 'This is gonna be one hell of a week.' She positioned herself against the wall with the pen and with quick glance around to check nobody was looking, then neatly added a marking to the end of the sign up sheet.

_Grace Polk, 11pdh_

TBC


	2. Voices and bribery

Disclaimer: I don't own JoA.

I've been having some offline time recently (mainly due to my dad seeing the amount of time I spend on msn as being literally on par to a heroin addiction and moaning about it all the time) but I have exams tomorrow so I decided some serious revision delaying was in order (i.e. updating something). I apologise that it's been so long and that this chappie is kind-of off. It's been incredibly rushed.

In response to one of the reviews, I've never actually seen napoleon dynamite, so that's odd :s.

oOo

Just as the bell rang for History, Grace had announced she was taking a self-instigated field trip. After further investigation from Joan, this turned out to be Coffee and a cinnamon Danish at a near by coffee shop. Seeing the perfect opportunity to talk to Grace alone, Joan invited herself along.

'I kinda have a favour to ask you.' Joan stared intently at the floor, her crimson reflection staring back at her from the shine of the floor.

Grace appeared to consider this for a second before replying. 'No.'

'No?' Joan fought the urge to bang her head against a near by wall.

'I don't do favours. Especially not the kind Friedman asks for on a regular basis,' pure disgust flashed behind her eyes before she shook her head, 'But that's besides the point.'

Disturbed and yet strangely amused, Joan choked back a laugh. 'You won't even let me try and explain? Please?' Joan asked, regaining her composure.

'Why, what do you want? You sound suspicious.'

'Come on, I'll explain on the way.'

She pushed the guilt aside as they exited the building. After all, she was doing God's work. Surely allowances could be made as far as breaking a few rules went. As she followed Grace to the Coffee shop she tried to explain her favour.

oOo

Setting her plate and mug down on the tiny wooden table, Grace slid into the chair opposite Joan. Somewhat absently, she dipped her finger into the froth on her coffee and licked it off in one long sweep of her tongue before turning her attention to Joan. 'So let me get this strait Girardi, you're offering me your ipod and a promise to come to all my anarchist rallies for the next year, if I'll join a stupid pageant?'

'And forty-two dollars and twenty-seven cents,' Joan replied as she finished counting out her change.

'Bribery. How depraved of you.' Grace poured sugar into her coffee and then aimed the scrunched up wrapper at the trash. It missed. 'Damn. One second.' Grace went to pick the wrapper up and put it in the trash.

'Depraved but not beneath you, I'm hoping.' Joan mumbled as Grace returned to her seat.

'What makes you think I'll go for it, Girardi?'

'Erm, you really want an ipod? You want to help me out? Err…'

'Why do you care?' Grace demanded suddenly, tone aggressive as she began to uncurl her Danish into a long strip.

'I can't explain it, okay! Please Grace, just do this one little thing for me? Please, please, please?'

'Girardi, do you hear voices again?'

'That's irrelevant.'

'Is that a yes?'

'No Grace.'

'Okaaay.'

'Please?'

'No way in hell.'

'Oh' Her face faltered for a second. 'Wait, you could make like, a documentary! Yeah. It could be a political statement, cutting edge,'

'Girardi, you're babbling.'

'Think about it, you could be the one to show the world the true nature of Summer Stratford!'

'Tempting as that may be Joan, it still involves me joining a freakin beauty pageant! You do it.'

'It has to be you! Listen, if you get out in the first round, so be it. Just join, please?'

'And I get to make the documentary?'

Joan nodded vigorously.

'And I still get the ipod, even when I get out in the first 20 seconds?'

'IF you get out, but yes.'

'I'm not wearing a dress, or make up.'

'What? Is that a yes?' Joan sounded amazed.

'Maybe.'

'No, seriously, yes?'

'Yes. But never mind your voices, I'm concerned for my own mental health considering I just agreed to join a beauty pageant.'

'Yay! Not your mental health, obviously. The fact that you said yes. And I DO NOT hear voices.'

'Sure Girardi, sure. Did they tell you to say that?'

'Just shut up Grace.'

'The voices are aggressive. Interesting… Oh, where do I sigh up?'

'I err, might have done it for you already.'

'Girardi, I am going to kill you.'

'The voices might have something to say about that.'

'So you admit it! There are voices.'

'Eat your Danish.'

'Fine.'

oOo

TBC


End file.
